* PS 3575- 

Mir 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



018 395 553 6 X. 



Hollinger Corp. 



( 







1918 



coiv i *VAH, GOD OF BATTLES 
UP TO DATE 

THE GERMAN GOD 



By 
HARVEY M. WATTS, A.M., Litt.D. 

Author of "The Wife of Potiphar, with other Poerm," 

"The Faith of Princes," "Pennsylvania," "Lux 

Erat," Member of the Vigilantes, etc., etc. 




PHILADELPHIA 

THE JOHN C. WINSTON COMPANY 

1918 



r» 



«b 






«* 



^> 



S* 






51 



Copyright, 1918, by 
Harvey M. Watts 



ICLA5I290 2 



APR-3ISI9 



To the Memory of 

SECOND LIEUTENANT W1LMER E. HERR 

of the American Expeditionary Force in France, 

one of the first to fall in Lorraine, April 8, 1918, 

in an effort to save the world from the terrorism 

of the Imperial monster herein depicted. 



JEHOVAH, GOD OF BATTLES, UP TO DATE 

A Satire 

Soliloquy by William II on the eve of Palm Sunday, 1918. 

Scene— The Cabinet de Travail in the Palace at Potsdam. 

The Kaiser is looking out at the window over the park which darkens 
under the spring twilight. By his side, on a small table, lies an antique sword, 
Roman, with straight T-shaped handle, and a large Bible with many slips of 
crimson ribbon inserted in its pages to indicate certain books and texts upon 
which he has requested memoranda from the Imperial Chaplains and Pastors 
In order to pick out the text for the victory sermon. 

Through the closed doors of the Cabinet come, at times, the faint tones 
of a piano on which some attaches of the Palace are playing. Fragments 
from the Nibelungen music drama are heard and particularly the "Song of 
the Sword" from Siegfried. As the Kaiser's ear catches the Sword Motif ha 
takes his hand from the Bible which he was about to open, beats time on the 
window pane with his finger and exclaims: 

Jah, "Nothung, Nothung, neidliches Schwert," indeed! 

Jah, "Todt Iagst du in Trummern dort," too long! 

But now this blade, the German sword's alive, 

Its motif sounds through all the quickened earth, 

Its long-time forging true was not in vain. 

The Master never wrote a better line; 

Nor more prophetic, though most ears were dull 

And eyes were blind to what it signified. 

Prom Rheingold to the final score the call 

Thrills every soul who knows his race and name; 

The German folk, whose ways were e'er of peace, 

Yet, trained by me, know how to go to war; 

Sons of the sword. Lords of the flashing blade, 

"Die Falschen" shattered as by Siegfried's might, 

As France, wild for revenge, lured by the lies, 

The lies of Albion, is spent at last, 

Snared and betrayed by friends as false as weak. 

Whose punishment, delayed, is certain, sure, 

As "hands across the sea" stretch emptily, 

The gestures, like the words, full Impotent; 

Since time fights with and for us to the last. 

Our dice are loaded with the weight of men, 

Our heavier battalions, winners all, 

Whose triumph, vlct'ry, all must now confess. 



[7] 



JEHOVAH, GOD OF BATTL E B S, UP TO DATE 



Nor wrought the folk, nor swung they sword, In vain; 

And eo In forge, on farm and battlefront 

We have secured and kept our heritage. 

Facing the rising sun, we seek our place 

And shall not be denied our lot therein; 

Since, lo, we celebrate deeds uncompared, 

Success beyond all seeming chance and range 

Of human prowess, Irresistible; 

More than we hoped for was predestinate. 

As if ripe fruit, or rotten, fell by winds 

Sent by our God who smiles upon our cause, 

The end made to our hands and by them too. 

While we prepare te deums for our hosts, 

Our enemies repeat trisagions, 

Their kyries our triumph-lieds in fact, 

The Dies irae of a world in flames. 

But not the "6aeclum In fa villa" yet; 

Since I, protector, not the wrathful judge. 

Will save the remnant through our glorious peace; 

Our peace, not theirs, for so the world is bound — 

And bound, must look to us to heal its wounds, 

Must seek the balm of our own Gilead, 

That, as of old, awaits my royal touch. 

And whom I heal, and whom I shall pass by, 

Is all as I elect and God decrees. 

But, as I stand the victor, all is plain; 

My task is but begun; like husbandman, 

With cunning hands upon the worn-out stock 

Of ancient cultures, opposites, I'll graft 

Our own and let the world bear German fruit, 

What'er its origins or race intent. 

They well may bend in bough as twig's inclined, 

And I'll reset as well as find the twig 

And fix the inclination at my will. 

If they hold back I'll crush the brood of hate 

With no more twinges than the gardener knows, 

Who, booted, stalks along the sanded path, 

And treads the myriad ants which idly swarm, 

A realm in petto, ground beneath his heel! 

And so with me the larger purposes, 

My own and God's, control. Those who oppose 

Bring their own ruin as in Belgium 

Whose sheer Unfahigkeit in time of stress 

Deprived it of its separate estate; 



18] 



JEHOVAH, GOD OF BATTLES, UP TO DATE 



And dark Armenia whose hidden plots, 
Born of old schisms, ancient heresies, 
Fanatic stubborness, have doomed it quite; 
And Serbia strutting, when it should have crept 
Before us humbly, tripped and fell full prone. 
The stiff-necked ever thus invite their fate, 
And stumbling bring the world about their ears. 

I willed this not, nor planned a world at war. 

But those of Islam, men who walk with God, 

If not in our own way at least in theirs — 

How well they walk is lesson to us all — 

With vision, say 'tis "Kismet!" And, of truth, 

Since God reveals His hand in history, 

Gracious to those who know His mind and way, 

As says the Koran, there is fixed a term 

To every Nation and the issue's joined. 

When it is passed, no respite, all is o'er; 

Chance knocks upon the Door of Life but once! 

The lightsome never hear the knock nor ope, 

The feeble beat upon the bolts in vain. 

So pass my enemies whose term is up. 

As I seize all as ready legatee. 

Prepared, all things escheat as if by rote. 

Unreadiness is its own punishment 

As they well know who cry in pain "too late," 

Finding us masters where they idly ruled. 

Nor waste we time o'er their deep miseries; 

For weaklings jeopardize all sovereignty; 

The chain sums up the weakest link in strength. 

But laggard nations, which are out of pace. 

Shall never clog nor stop our chariot wheels. 

Nor shall they halt the progress of the world, 

Their fell disease calls loudly for the knife, 

Lest it contaminate the healthy flesh, 

And, like contagion, spread beyond control. 

Cruel in deed, am I, but kind in fact. 

And know the stroke that cleaves and likewise cleans, 

Which, multiplied in war's enmillioned might, 

Saves by its very menace, since, disguised, 

War is the benison for us, for all. 

The double blessing to a nation torn; 

New valors blossom in the humblest heart, 

New virtues spring where once was selfishness, 



[9] 



JEHOVAH, GOD OF BATTLES, UP TO DATE 



And all the folk at one in sacred cause, 

Sloughing their sins as if confessed of God, 

Are shrived as though before the judgment seat. 

For lo, while Europe, slothful, lay asleep, 

I saw the fiery dragon in the sky, 

More fearsome than a Fafner in the toils. 

The Yellow Peril, and opposed my might, 

Mailed as to fist, and armed from top to toe, 

Jehovah's sword am I and double-edged. 

Woe, woe to them who stand athwart my path. 

Our Etzel my exemplar to the end, 

In Attila I saw myself forecast, 

Flagella peccatorum, as our Lord, 

And instrument devoted in his hands; 

A scourge of God in fact as well as fame, 

But, like the fire, a cauter and a cure! 

So I have fought the fight and kept the faith 

E'en as my allies, quick of ear and hand, 

Who keep with me the sacred word and strive 

Under the banner of the Caliphate. 

Pawns in my play who move as I direct. 

This is the law of Nations and of right, 

The "must" and "ought" of Kant's imperative, 

The category of the ruling mind, 

That keeps the conscience and the State as one. 

This is the inspiration of success, 

The cause and conduct of a war most just. 

Nations no less than Nature must obey 

The universal rule that seeks the fit 

And arms them with the right divine to live, 

Surviving while their enemies are crushed. 

Darwin is ours! his law we have applied 

As law of action, superseding cults, 

Since war selects unerringly its own 

While some are raised to honor, victis vae! 

Treitschke foresaw, foretold, forewarned them all 

In open prophecy, the day of days; 

And force and frightfulness the direful means; 

Direful for those who sat with folded hands 

As we prepared the nation to a man 

And gave the countersign of hope to all; 

Strike without mercy, slay without a trace. 

Our knights whose cloak is white if cross be black- 



10] 



JEHOVAH, GOD OF BATTLES, UP TO DATE 



The omen is propitious to our cause — 

For ever set their seal upon our way; 

The olden way that suits our cause today. 

And stand the model of our conquering hosts. 

Who have, in newer Tannenberg, redeemed 

Their marshes, soaked with blood expiator 

Of those who set our feet upon the path 

Of empire through the sure Teutonic soul, 

Strengthening the stroke of surer Teuton sword, 

Time's long-delayed requital found at last; 

Lex talionis, law of tooth and claw, 

None left with eyes but those that weep their fate! 

Wagner was right, the sword is over all. 

And would a greater might arise to set 

A newer scoring for this flashing steel 

Our own Excalibur, a sacred sign! 

Our "in ho.c signo vinces," by the sword, 

And not the cross as Constantine averred, 

Who, wearied, saw, on high in Rhenish lands. 

His haloed labarum in blazing sky; 

In terror of the omen, full distraught, 

Grasped at the shadow and misread the sign. 

For, hold the blade with handle upright, so. 

The chorus does it very well in "Faust," 

And e'er the blood-wet weapon turns a cross. 

But still for that it is the blade that wins 

So we reverse the omen to our gain. 

In signo hoc — Tea, they who only know 

The little arc of their own destiny, 

Nor saw the greater circle which I scanned, 

Have brought this ruin on themselves, the fools! 

They read the story but to miss the point, 

We make the past convenient stepping stones, 

Or fingerposts that point the only way, 

Or charted seas with all shoals indicate. 

And I in Russia have applied the hint 

And made their present debtor to our past. 

As Friedrich knew that Poland could not live 

Save as a vassal of a greater line, 

Since all things whirl inexorably by law, 

Each center with attendant satellites, 

Quiring in harmony and lasting peace, 

As once proud Rome, the golden hub, controlled 



[11] 



JEHOVAH, GOD OF BATTLES, UP TO DATE 



All destinies. Gained not by single stroke, 

As -when Caligula — to me ein Narr— 

Wished that his enemies had but one neck, 

But surely, each in turn, till all were won. 

"Divide and conquer," 'twas the ancient aim, 

"Which we apply in quintessential force, 

As fortune shows the way and eke the means. 

Before the Caesars glorified the rule. 

Inheritors of all their greater lore, 

Roman in all but name, we take our own. 

And take it first; by that the game is won. 

Enslaved by me, the conquered do our tasks. 

I leave to them their self-determined way 

So long as they promote the end desired; 

The end that justifies our every deed. 

Nor quarrel I o'er means that get results; 

Since war is war, why count the units lost? 

The mass is all that matters in the main, 

As eggs are broken in the omelet! 

For omnia prona victoribus was writ 

Of England conquered and full bound in chains. 

Victors the world will grovel at your feet 

Where conquered you accept their jibes and gyves. 

"Auferre, trucidare, rapere," 

Says Tacitus of Britain's ancient woes. 

"Yes, rape and rapine," so his venom runs, 

"Misnamed as Empire overcame the world." 

With appetite beyond the chance to glut, 

Since "Quos non Oriens, non Occidens 

Et satiaverit," they quote at me. 

"With equal avid wish, abundance, want 

The rich, the poor they coveted and seized." 

And yet, and yet, their bounds, periphery, 

The urbs et orbis, circle of the lands, 

Spite of the slanders, words of British hate, 

Where'er the conqueror went were blessed with peace; 

That Pax Romana that redeemed the earth, 

As now that peace that comes alone through me, 

My peace to which I'll dedicate a shrine — 

Our Ara Pacis more imperial 

Than that Augustus raised with easy fame, 

Rome's latest wonder, pigmy though to mine 

As Leipzig's monument forecasts in bulk — 

And glorify as Pax, Pax Candida, 



[12] 



JEHOVAH, GOD OF BATTLES, UP TO DATE 



Shining fore'er as Pax Germanica! 

They whine o'er this and cry "Atrocities!" 

And scream o'er women plotters, rightly slain, 

Of loose-lived soldiers by us crucified; 

A warning seen but once not soon forgot, 

And quote the massacre of innocents. 

Well, Herod is traduced through lying text; 

The Matthew Gospel stands in this impure. 

Then, as of me, they spread the cunning tale, 

Maligned the Imperial dignity and power, 

Imputed evils that their mind evoked. 

But if it were necessity, all's well! 

I join the tetrarch, nor condemn the act 

When it is done for purposes of State; 

Women and children first, lest they should prove 

Impedimenta that might block our way, 

Since infants make a ready blind for men. 

And tottering peasants screen an ambuscade. 

So let them prattle of our blood and iron; 

And I will answer with the roar of guns. 

My Empire is the cannon's farthest range, 

Its limits marked alone by force of arms, 

Where flies the flag o'er the sea, where tread my troops, 

This is my challenge flung both far and wide. 

No bounds of Hercules in narrowed strait 

Confine us to the seas as known of old. 

The Baltic and the Middle Seas our own, 

The ocean turned into a German lake. 

This is "Der Tag" we toasted to the skies, 

And this expansion is but Nature's law, 

And its accomplishment a holy cause, 

Our Jehad, dear to me and all my line, 

Since our green banner bears the one device, 

As supermen the supramundum cry; 

The Fatherland o'er all, o'er all the world. 

Victor abroad, at home my will is law 

In court and temple, fane and synagogue, 

Semite and anti-Semite do my will, 

And all the Christian faiths hang on my word. 

No bleak Canossa lies before my path, 

The Vatican's decrees sing small indeed. 

They talk of "peace," "impartiality"; 

Ah, c'est-a-rire, indeed, they know my thought; 



[13] 



JEHOVAH, GOD OF BATTLES, UP TO DATE 



These non-cathedra murmurings are vain, 

Mere tinkling brass, solemn but empty sound. 

My sanction supersedes their canon law, 

Their "imprimatur" is my manual, 

The text is theirs, the inspiration mine. 

They know a Fontainebleau awaits them all, 

So they dissemble, and, with feeble show 

Of power, "thunder in the indices." 

Our Cardinals, 'tis true, have all the port 

And ancient pomp of princes of the realm. 

He of Cologne is Bourbon to the hat, 

As arrogant as Hildebrand himself, 

But Hildebrand in exile knew the day 

Of disillusion and of shattered hopes. 

The punishment for pride that rode to fall. 

And Munich stands the censor of belief, 

Would cloak the civil in the prelate's robe, 

They know not Luther, Reuchlin is forgot, 

Erasmus as if not, but we shall see. 

A newer Kultur-kampf may ope their eyes 

When backed by bombs and zeppelins in flight; 

The Sistine knows the calibres of guns, 

For dogma yields to lay majorities, 

And they to force, and so the circle's run. 

Yet they extend my person and my power 

Since all must bow before me and obey. 

The Jews, too, ever ingrates, are of use 

In race apart they know no Nation's heart, 

Exiled, "dispersed" from far Judean soil, 

They like Antaeus out of touch with earth, 

Have lost their fighting spirit once their wont 

And find their "Promised Land" in lanes of trade, 

The "milk and honey" in the interest rate. 

Unstable as a woman's whims they cower, 

But garner where our steel has reaped the grain. 

Their bankers cried that they "would have no war." 

Poof, poof, like thistledown before the gale their weight 

When war broke out and boundaries disappeared, 

And credit, like the laws, or stood or fell 

As arms determined and the battle's gage. 

I'll teach them what the Ghetto really meana, 

I'll have the synagogues reform their ways, 

And quote the prophets to sustain my throne. 

And new phylacteries shall spell my wish, 

[14] 



J E H O V AH, GOD OF BATTLES, UP TO DATE 



Instead of mumbo-jumbo for a text 
Mere amuletg of Bedouins at the best. 
If they plot anarchy as is the wont 
Of kith and kin in Russia, vermin all, 
They'll face a Pale from Posen to the sea 
And know the clink of something else than gold. 
But I full know their cultus helps my cause, 
Just as the Suras are a mine of wealth 
Of racial law, domestic wisdom too 
Since all the East is wise in its own way. 
And we may profit while we hold our own 
Compelling tribute to the State's one aim, 
Its strength in numbers knowing but our will. 
But this is vain if numbers melt away 
Before the stress of war without recoup. 
And men and women turn to epicenes — 
Forgetting "Male and female made He them" 
Like to the birds in air, the beasts in field 
Nor spoiled by manners of the close or cage- 
As pundits quarrel over customs, means, 
And crown virginity with claustral phrase, 
And empty cradles menace e'en the throne; 
Man-strength is but the babe-in-arms of age! 
The Talmud, in the face of facts, allows 
The long familiar habit of the folk, 
Yet sets no seal, no more than Islam does, 
Of prim approval on the equal bond 
Of man and mate, since need must e'er decide 
The moral obligations of the State. 
And I decide what custom must approve; 
The State's summed up in me and fixed in mine! 
And in this crisis, lo, our course is clear. 
One duty falls with equal force on all. 
As war upsets the olden rule of life, 
The law, command divine, "Increase and multiply," 
The cornerstone by God, ordained of old, 
Should be for us a potent lease of power. 
Mahomet proved the seer in this, nor stood! 
Upon lax preachments; yet, we, weak, recoil, 
E'en though the Mormon State has proved anew 
That chastity is but the soul's intent. 
The home is oft the harem, thin disguised, 
And childless, loveless, too, a hollow sham, 
So out upon this cheap hypocrisy 



[15] 



JEHOVAH, GOD OF BATTLES, UP TO DATE 



And let us take the lesson to our hearts, 

Find newer virtue in new sacrifice. 

Let women ne'er forget their "rule of three," 

Church, chores and children, sole and only aim, 

And make the family, as of old, the fount 

And firm foundation of a lasting State. 

Nor hazard future years by false ideas. 

The people at their best, our brawn and brain, 

Are but the shadow of my competence. 

And I will shape them to our signal ends. 

I stand upon the pinnacle of fame, 

A new Assyria rises into view. 

Austria, my vassal, at my beck and call, 

With kings and princes as my satrapies, 

For Alexander, Caesar, Charlemagne, 

Ne'er knew such triumphs as are ours by arms. 

For lo, as from a lofty mountain height 

The Kingdoms of the world laid out in plan, 

Reticulate as if from 'plane in flight, 

Are spread as feast before my searching eyes, 

Which catch a glory of the Greater East 

Reflecting glory of the Greater West. 

The Orient was ever in my dreams, 

Its plains have ever held my deep desires. 

Its hills my ardent hopes, where old and new 

Meet on the shining way that leads at last 

Past Bagdad to the seas that wash the Ind 

Under the yellow moon of Schahriar, 

Beneath the rose tree where old Omar sleeps, 

And through the fastnesses of Afghan gorge. 

With Delitsch I have lived the lives of old, 

Restored in splendor Asshurbanipal, 

Symbol of all my plans of empiry, 

Spawned in the East, perfected in the West. 

A second Constantine, I, on the Rhine, 

Which, safely German, laves its banks in peace, 

No longer subject to Ovidian sneers. 

The "Rhenus squalidus" 'midst "broken reeds," 

Shall, lo, evoke the West that is our East 

And East that's West as our own leaven works. 

Russia my footstool, washpot, too, in fact, 

The Euxine held by us in simple fee, 

The Golden Horn, a bauble in our hands. 



[161 



JEHOVAH, GOD OF BATTLES, UP TO DATE 



The Drang nach Osten realized at last; 

Where we may bask and stretch ourselves at 

Yes, In the sun at his meridian height. 

For I have trod the Holy Land and gazed 

In silence on grey-walled Gethsemane, 

And, from on high, on sloping Olivet, 

Saw mine own tower o'er Jerusalem, 

Triumphant rising in the Muristan; 

Above all domes and minarets supreme. 

Supreme o'er David's tower and battlements; 

A prophecy of my intent and will. 

And had they read it better for them all. 

For more was broken down than olden walls 

And parapets of Solymein the Great, 

When, through the breach that looks toward Joppa, I, 

Acclaimed by all, came in a Paladin, 

In shining panoply in knightly guise, 

A second Barbarossa, aye, in state. 

And shared the privileges oft denied 

The great in dim and inner secret shrines. 

Had I but gone to Mecca, Ah, in truth, 

Arabia at my feet, the desert bound 

In fealty of faith to my own whims, 

Would follow, camel-wise, where'er I led. 

I'll have a fetva yet, for what are creeds 

To those who tread the higher ways of life — 

And King and Kaiser, I'll be Caliph too; 

Lord of all Asia and the whirling globe. 

A newer Petrus, I; I, too, have seen 

The vision of the heavenly sheet let down 

And know the meaning of the clear command 

"Consider nothing common or unclean!" 

We Germans know our destiny, our fate, 

Our learning is for all a tonic draft 

Of living waters from the sacred rock, 

A panacea seen by Malachi, 

That Sun of Righteousness whose radiant beams 

Light up the earth with glory all its own. 

Through me the synthesis of all belief, 

The universal solvent, Alcahest, 

Philosophy with all its dross expurged, 

Becomes the touchstone of my people's weal. 



[it; 



JEHOVAH, GOD OF BATTLES, UP TO DATE 



For gods are made in man's own image, aye, 

And badly made at that in foolishness, 

As all the deities invent, attest. 

Chemosh and Marduk, Moloch all are one 

Squabbling like vultures o'er the carrion fields 

Of war, and eager for the praise of men; 

The praise of men who cry them, "Victors all!" 

These be the gods of old, e'en Isi-ael's — 

Jahveh is Judah 'tween the cherubim, 

While "Allah" is but Arab written large. 

The desert spawns its prophets as the sand 

Yields up the incense-bearing shrubbery. 

The elders walk with God, the young cry out 

Their burning visions to the passers-by; 

The very "res angustae" give them point. 

When gaunt of body, lo, the soul expands, 

And, starved at home, they spread their truths abroad, 

For logothetes were early in the field 

In Babylon as at Byzantium. 

But I would strike the balance with them all. 

Combine the logos with the blade that cures. 

But for the sword, Mohammed might have mused 

Upon the Meccan housetops all in vain, 

Hailed as a babbler, dreamer of vain dreams, 

And jeered and hooted in the market place. 

But, lo, when from Medina swept his horde, 

Fire in their eye and fury in their heart, 

Who neither asked, nor quarter gave, in sooth, 

The Empire rose again in the Eastern lands, 

And Allah and his prophet claimed their due. 

And like Jehovah, or the earlier line 

Of village deities, the parish bonds 

Were burst asunder by the feat of arms, 

And lo, dominion came with sword and book, 

And book proved by the sword became the law. 

As our Kultur is now before the world. 

For, in the melting-pot, faiths equalize; 

And so with Islam mine, our Lord still shrined, 

Yet I am not unmindful of our own, 

The ancient runes of wood-folk, hero-bred, 

Who know the fetish and Its magic power; 

The Bismarck "turms" upon the ancient heights, 

Druidic altars of the empire's birth, 



[18] 



JEHOVAH, GOD OP BATTLES, UP TO DATE 



Like Baal-flres kindled as a warning sign; 

Or, lo, as Mars, the giant Hindenburg, 

Colossal idol of the people's hopes, 

Studded with golden nails, a new taboo 

Our procul, procul, O, profani, Ah, 

The Ur-mind harking to its olden call. 

An avatar of ancient ruthlessness. 

An Ariovistus in the flesh once more. 

But lo, a chief whom fortune never falls — 

The jade does ever favor those who seize 

Her by the scruff, deaf to all niceties — 

Thus we improve the breed and sturdy stock, 

React to all the heart-pull of the race. 

And, as the Valkyrs sweep the darkening Bky, 

Our Wotan, Thor and Loki rise in sight 

Our Northern forbears, yes, our three in one, 

Their contradictions all resolved by me, 

Et deum invenlam aut faciam, 

I'll find a god or make one to my taste — 

Since by my right on earth, vice regent, I, 

In essence Godlike in my Majesty 

Summus episcopus, I, thus declare 

This thing amalmagate from Holy Writ, 

Disjecta membra of the old beliefs, 

Welded be me, as Siegmund's broken shards 

Into the tempered blade that nought withstood. 

The Norseland sagas, Islam's litanies, 

Lore of the East and wisdom of the West, 

Jehovah, God of Battles, up to date, 

Improved by me in world-compelling cult, 

Once tribal now shall dominate the earth: — 

Judea's hilltop Lord, the German God, 

Der alte Gott der Deutschen und der Welt, 

But ruling not alone, aye, not alone! 

The Kaiser turns abruptly, picks up the Bible and begins to finger tho 
different marked places, his eye lighting up as he notes the familiar and 
favorite texts and, carefully readjusting certain of the markers, he continued 
his musing: 

They ask me to select the victory text. 

Aye, they do well— It must be done with care, 

With full regard to our dynastic claims 

[19] 



EHOVAH, GOD OF BATTLES, UP TO DATE 



And what this people mean before the world. 

I will not have a war of petty creeds 

Splitting thin hairs of doctrine in my cause. 

In this great moment of the Empire's life, 

One thought, one mind, one heart, one hope is ours. 

The pulpit may embellish, give its gloss, 

And suit the language to its auditors, 

Simple or high and rich or poor or great, 

Small is the difference so they follow me; 

As ships lie moored at anchorage and veer 

And float this way and that as shifts the tide. 

But ever steadfast to the hidden chains 

That keep them In the channel and the course. 

So I would hold all anchored to my will 

And to the word that Justifies our cause. 

To fix the mob-mind is a care of State. 

And these the shepherds of the flock should learn 

How best to drive and what the path shall be. 

I'll have the rectors work the problem out 

And let the pastors echo my ideas, 

With each professor prophesying too. 

The text, from Old or New, it matters not, 

Save that the message ring out loud and clear 

With due respect to what the sword has won 

These are the compass points of my concern. 

The North and South of all my policy. 

No Caesar, pontifex as well as dux, 

E'er saw a world so helpless at hie feet. 

My apotheosis at last is nigh; 

The auguries must be manipulate, 

The signs uphold me in my deep designs. 

I'll brook no play of empty phrase to prove 

Some fond perversion of plans foreordained. 

No; nothing left to chance lest feeble wits, 

Whose hearts are not much softer than their heads, 

Should seek with .muddled vision to confuse 

The growing testament that vindicates 

Our every deed — The Law, the Prophets, too, 

The Gospel and Epistles, word for word, 

Whose myriad texts like clouds of witnesses 

Yield richest savor, incense for our cause 

Interpreted by rubrics all mine own. 

So those who cry of "ploughshares, pruning hooka," 



[20] 



JEHOVAH, GOD OF BATTLES, UP TO DATE 



Like children playing on the cliff edge stand 

In slippery places menaced by my wrath. 

For I will none of this; hew to the line, 

Stand by your guns exult and magnify! 

E'en Jesus, who is Joshua new spelled — 

A Joshua too much compassionate 

Whose views are not in full accord with mine, 

Yet hath He said, "To Caesar render all 

Of tribute that is his and eke to God 

The measure that is His in equal part." 

So thus he recognized the state supreme — 

They would misquote. And yet He counsels war — 

Bernhardi notes it in his argument — 

Cries out, "I come not here to send you peace, 

But lo, a sword, as is my father's wish." 

He knew his mission as do I know mine. 

But as the clangors of the bells succeed 

The diapason of the battlefields, 

I fain would quote the elder texts that breathe 

The throb and threat of men in bloody shock; 

Texts filled with wrath divine that seeks no peace: 

"Their youth shall die, no remnant shall be left. 

The men of Anathoth shall know our God, 

The Lord of Hosts, and die there by His sword." 

So Jeremiah strikes the tonic key, 

And with him is Ezekiel, whose words 

Roll out and on as distant sound of drums. 

Bold hymns of conquest and of hearty hate. 

They sing the old song of the sword, not new, 

As, lo, it slaked its thirst in thousands slain 

As God reached down among Judean hills, 

And cities fell, their smoke a cloud by day 

And fiery pillar in the purple night. 

Why palter we, or falter, when we read 

The adjuration all so plainly writ: 

Exult with these of old who slew and sang, 

And sang just as they slew, as we do now. 

But no one text can satisfy today. 

I would a chorus sang in sweeping tones. 

The words of Deborah in ecstacy; 

Or with the timbrel followed Miriam's song, 

For she rejoiced in Pharaoh's hosts o'erwhelmed 

And knew her God was lord of those who fight. 

Tea, shout aloud so that the world may hear 



[21] 



JEHOVAH, GOD OF BATTLES, UP TO DATE 



"For Saul has slain his thousands," Oh, rejoice, 

"And David multiplied the blow by tens." 

Paltry these numbers as we count our dead, 

A thousand thousand and still incomplete, 

Laid on the altar of the Fatherland, 

A willing offer from us all to bind 

With blood my august rule and sacred throne! 

They send Ecclesiastes for a text; 

For says the Preacher well, "There's time to love, 

And time to hate, yes hate, and time to war, 

And then, in sooth, he holds a time of grace. 

The kind of grace is matter for our will. 

But Samuel, Kings and both the Chronicles 

Bear witness that our conquest is of right. 

We are the besom of the living God, 

The chosen to secure His righteous rule. 

Fools, fools, who pass by Judges, Genesis, 

Nor know the lessons taught by Exodus. 

Each verse and chapter forms the Book of Fate; 

A light unto my path, a lamp, indeed, 

To mine own feet that took the open road. 

The Psalmist is our hope for every act, 

Reprisals have God's full authority; 

"Reward them as they serve thee," thus he sings. 

"And happy they who take the little ones 

And dash their heads against the very 6tones." 

Nor do the verses fail me in support, 

My favorite, the Ninety-third, rings true, 

Drysander uses it with marked effect. 

And when I hear It quoted in the Dom, 

Or sung as Psalter, to myself I cry 

'Tls I; they sing of me, I'm Majesty, 

The words but changed, the phrases are of me, 

"The Lord is clothed with Majesty and strength, 

His throne is, yea, of old, and is not moved, 

The Testimonies of his words are sure, 

And, mightier than the sea in all its rage, 

The voice of many nations and the storm, 

Ib Majesty upon its awful throne." 

My throne IS awful as I sit the judge 

Upon these people who provoke my wrath. 

And then the Twenty-fourth is balm indeed, 

Balm and the wind that stirs the very soul. 

[22] 



JEHOVAH, GOD OF BATTLES, UP TO DATE 



Strange that the Pastoral, the Twenty -third, 

That "babbles of green fields" and quiet pools. 

Of shepherds gently guarding tender sheep, 

Should preface such a vision of ray might. 

For what is this? "Lift up your heads, ye gates. 

Be lifted up, ye everlasting doors, 

Be lifted that the King" — aye, what a line! — 

"The King of Glory may come in in pomp. 

Who is the King of Glory?" How it stirs! 

"The Lord of Hosts, of Sabaoth, is King," 

Indeed my king fore'er, and, as I read, 

I see myself in cavalcade sweep through 

The Brandenburger gate while all cry out 

"Our King of Glory is come in!" Or, more, 

In that great dream of dreams, when 'neath the Arch, 

The Arch of Triumph, with its chains removed, 

I stride, the Master, "Lift your heads, ye gates! 

And be ye lifted, everlasting doors." 

The crowd should cry aloud as if compelled 

By awe of me, the All-highest, as they see 

The princes join in homage as I pass. 

And now the day of Palms, the day of days, 

Is here at last, the day long prophesied. 

And as I hear the text, "Hosannah, hail," 

The words ring in my ears as bells of joy, 

My accolade from those who know my rights, 

"Hosannah, blest the King of Israel, 

Who cometh in the name of God Himself." 

So John narrates the moving scene of old. 

I read it with the inner light and see 

Myself in triumph midst the palms, the world, 

Remade by me, its ruler, at my feet. 

"For, lo. they went before, bearing the palms." 

Yes, palmam qui meruit, who more than I? 

Ah, that my star combine the Easter burst 

Of splendor, and this charnel house of war 

Become the open tomb of newer life, 

Ne'er sensed by man and known to God alone. 

Of newer life and opportunities 

But to the text, that is my great concern; 

Upon its aptness hangs a new success. 

The Prophets speak of unrelenting hate 

Of those who knew the sword, and, humbled, find 



[23] 



JEHOVAH, GOD OF BATTLES, UP TO DATE 



Themselves a portion for the foxes, Ah, 

"Defile the house and fill the courts with slain, 

And multiply them in the streets at will, 

The terror of the sword let loose without, 

And pestilence within and famine dire," 

"Let Midianites as one be safely slain; 

Because the Lord is with those who pursue 

The sword of God and Gideon prevails." 

What richness in the texts; what range of choice! 

The lesson must be plain to all, nor hid, 

So let all speak and not equivocate. 

I'd have them use the Book of Joshua. 

It's full of meat as honeycomb of sweets, 

Telling of Hittite feuds, of Amorites, 

Amalekites at bay, then smitten sore, 

Leaves nothing out that justifies our ways; 

The sack of Ai and haughty Jericho, 

Of Gibeon and Hebron in the South; 

Of Jericho, whose walls fell prone, nor rose, 

Of Gibeon, whose kings fell in their pride 

And all the country far and wide laid waste, 

Makkedah, Debir, Hazor, in the plains, 

The plains of Chinneroth and Gezer, too, 

Lachish and Eglon, Libnah by the sword, 

The sword of him who stayed the setting sun 

And held the wandering moon o'er Ajalon, 

The sign and symbol of his victory, 

Who fought the foes of God as I have done 

And by His favor smote them hip and thigh 

From Gaza unto Goshen, nor did rest 

Till one-and-thirty kings were in the toils, 

Caught in the snare and hanged at fall of night, 

Upon the one-and-thirty gibbets hanged, 

Then thrown at evening, such the common lot, 

In carrion pit, all utterly destroyed 

And those who followed stricken to a man, 

Nor spared the youth, nor women, babe at breast, 

Who knew, as God smiled on his handiwork, 

In sooth, His peace, the peace of Joshua: 

His peace, in truth, the only peace for me. 

I'll have this preached within the Dom, proclaimed 

From all the pulpits throughout all the realm, 

That Joshua's peace is our own holy peace, 



[24] 



J 
JEHOVAH, GOD OF BATTLES, UP TO DATE 



The peace of Joshua, the son of Nunn, 

The peace that's by the sword and of the sword, 

And for the sword, a lasting peace that holds. 

These worthies of the Bible knew their minds 

And found their God a not unwilling aid, 

As I, as I, the credit where it fits, — 

To whom the credit's due, my people know, 

So let us to the text and settle all; 

I'll put the marker, so, to keep the place, 

It lies in Chapter Ten, Verse Forty-two: 

"And all the kings and all their utmost lands 

Did Joshua take, take in his time, because 

Jehovah fought for Israel " Enough! 

This is the text for me, the victory text, 
And let the Pastors cry it everywhere, 
The peace of Joshua, the son of Nunn, 
Jehovah's peace, won by the sword alone, 
A German peace and on our terms at last! 

CODA 
As the Kaiser lays down the Bible a look of Intense satisfaction steals 
over his face and his gratification is so great that, as he gazes again into the 
Park, he hums the lines from the Lorelei as set to music by Liszt, not the 
folk-song version of Silcher, and continues: 

Die luft ist kuhl — es dunkelt — schnell; yah wohl, 

I like the Abbe's setting, Yes, 'tis cool, 

Und ruhig fliesst der Rhein, der deutsche Rheln, 

Ah, German still because of our good sword. 

Naught else buys peace and keeps it "fest und treu;" 

Es dunkelt, schnell, I'll have the lights at once, 

The evening's tranquil as when Goethe wrote 

Upon the crystal pane, "O'er all the heights," 

Und uber alien Gipfeln ist Ruh, die Ruh! 

"O'er all the heights there shines our German peace." 

This Easter ecstasy is God's own way. 

Und uber alien Gipfeln ist Ruh, die Ruh, 

Die Ruh, die Ruh — What, who, who stalks within? 

What khaki-clothed mummer is this man? 

The lights! The lights! Es dunkelt, schnell, the lights! 

A Chaplain with the Stars and Stripes, full pale, 

His voice, his voice is of the sepulcher. 

His words are of the burial liturgy, 

Die Luft ist kuhl; I feel a sudden chill. 



25 



JEHOVAH, GOD OF BATTLES, UP TO DATE 



A text; a text for victory, hia words. 

What is this mummery, this Bible drip? 

BLESSED ARE THEY WHO THIRST FOR RIGHTEOUSNESS 

AND HUNGER FOR IT— THEY SHALL ALL BE FILLED. 

He would berate me with beatitudes! 

And quote the scriptures in contrariness 

BLESSED ARE THEY INDEED; THE MEEK WITHAL, 

THEY SHALL INHERIT— 

Lo, what words are these 
In etern monition from his ghastly lips? 
BE NOT DECEIVED; GOD IS NOT MOCKED, 
LO, WHATSOE'ER YE SOW THAT SHALL YE REAP. 
AND YE THAT DRAW THE SWORD AND STRIVE BY IT 
SHALL PERISH BY THE SAME, FOR SO 'TIS WRIT. 
The Hohenzollern way runs counter-wise, 
The sword has been our stead for centuries. 
VENGEANCE IS MINE, I SHALL REQUITE INDEED 
AND SAVE YE NEITHER BY THE SWORD NOR SPEAR, 
YEA, MENE, MENE, TEKEL, UPHARSIN, HEAR 
The words are gibberish as all men know. 
The thing deciphered after the event, 
A parable for those of kindlich mind, 
Kindlich not konigliche as our own. 

THY DAYS ARE NUMBERED AND THE END IN SIGHT. 
THY KINGDOM IS FOREVER LOST TO THEE 
Old sayings, threadbare and without avail, 
Repeated oft and so dilute and vain. 

AND LO! THE BEAST WHOSE NAME WAS BLASPHEMY, 
THE HORNED BEAST AND CROWNED WITH THE CROWN. 
WHOSE POWER, THOUGH DRAGON-GIVEN, WAS NOT FORE'BR. 
THY CROWN A RIM OF FIRE UPON THY HEAD, 
A WRITHING SERPENT-CIRCLET, VENOM-FILLED! 
la this a dream, fatigue of war-tired brain, 
Or daze from too much pondering o'er the texts? 
I'll none of it! — Ah, faced, it disappears. 
Who reads this riddle must himself be mad, 
For Revelation lies 'neath Luther's ban 
The canon is in doubt, the text not sure — 

WHOSE NAME AND NUMBERS, SIX AND SIX AND SIX. 
SET OUT THE MONSTER VOID OF HEART AND SOUL 
A NAME A HISSING IN THE HALLS OF MEN, 
A BYE-WORD SPAT WITH HORROR FROM THE LIPS. 
What boots this anti-Nero haggada. 
This Armageddon clatter of the beast, 



[20] 



JEHOVAH, GOD OF BATTLES, UP TO DATE 



This anti-Christ, this war of vials and seals. 

I'll prove a Daniel in the judgment seat, 

And read our primacy in every line, 

For prophecy is certain when you know; 

And Hebrew numerals arranged at will. 

Spell Caesar or the village simpleton. 

Still in my ears the voice, the form still seen. — 

Gott, I have read too long — too long — my eyes! 

This ringing in my ears — It darkens fast — 

What, What; He cries again! 

MEN SHALL, DESIRE 
AND SEEK FOR DEATH, SUCH IS THEIR WEIGHT OF SHAME, 
AND KNOW THE TORTURES OF THE NETHER PIT, 
THE SEVEN SEALS AND SEVEN MYSTERIES, 
WEIGHED THOU OF GOD AND FOUND AT FAULT IN ALL, 
THE CAIN OF RULERS, LIFE'S LONE ISHMAEL, 
WHOSE HAND'S AGAINST A WORLD ENGULFED IN HATE 
AND THEIRS AGAINST HIM 

Ah, not so, not so! 
As God's my judge the sword was forced on me! 
AND CAIN SLEW ABEL AND WAS CURSED OF GOD. 
The brother's keeper cry once more is heard! 
And Cain was but a weakling, not so I. 
AND CAIN CRIED OUT. IN ANGUISH OF THE SOUL 
MY PUNISHMENT IS MORE THAN I CAN BEAR. 
THE WINE-PRESS OF THE WRATH OF GOD THY FATE; 
THE WINE-PRESS THOU HAST FILLED TO RUNNING O'ER.— 
TO RUNNING O'ER WITH BLOOD OF INNOCENCE, 
WHOSE BLOOD CRIES, "VENGEANCE!" FROM THE TORTURED 

EARTH! 
LO, WHO OFFENDETH THESE OUR LITTLE ONES, 
THE LITTLE ONES WHO PLAY ABOUT OUR FEET, 
BEFORE ALL STANDS AS IF A MILLSTONE HANGED 
ABOUT HIS NECK IN SHAMEFUL PILLORY. 
Luft! Luft! The lights! The guards! I faint! The lights! 
UPON THE IMPERIAL BROW THE BRAND OF CAIN. 
BRANDED FORE'ER BEFORE A WORLD OF WOE, 
IMPERIAL LEPER BY ALL EXECRATE. 
BARABBAS ON THE CROSS WITH FATE DESERVED 
AND JUDAS, WHO BETRAYED, KNEW FULL REMORSE. 
THINK NOT THIS BITTER CUP SHALL PASS FROM THEE. 
BEHOLD IT IN THY HAND; DRINK TO THE DREGS, 
THE DREGS OF IGNOMINY, SURE DEFEAT! 
FOREDOOMED, FOREDAMNED, AND ALL THY EVIL LINE, 



[27] 



JEHOVAH, GOD OF BATTLES, UP TO DATE 



THY PUNISHMENT— 

No, no — not so — the lights! 
Luft — luft — I choke — I faint — es dunkelt, Ah — 
The brand of Cain — of Cain — of Cain — fore'er — 
Upon the Imperial brow the brand of Cain — 
My punishment is greater — Ah — the dark — 
Am ende — luft — the dark — the dark — the dark! ! 
Am ende, Gott, the dark is over all! 



Falls heavily to (he floor in a swoon. 



Written February-March, 1918. Read before the Phi Beta Kappa, 
University of Pennsylvania, May 1, 1918. 



[28 J 



i| L « B iri*Miiii 0F C0NGRESS 

l"lHll IjINIIlJIlJiril"!: 

018 395 553 6 • 



